


we met our match and struck first

by voodoochild



Category: World Wrestling Entertainment
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Bilingual Character(s), Bisexual Male Character, M/M, Muslim Character, Not Kayfabe Compliant, Sami is Generico, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-12
Updated: 2019-05-12
Packaged: 2020-03-01 06:47:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 911
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18795115
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/voodoochild/pseuds/voodoochild
Summary: Sami has the same name written on both wrists, and he knows his soulmate is fated to be both a blessing and a curse [Soulmate AU]





	we met our match and struck first

**Author's Note:**

> This is a soulmate AU that isn't connected to the poly-soulmate AU of "[the flood and the fire both run clear](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15062036)". The title is from Doomtree's "Team the Best Team" because me.
> 
> Written for a Tumblr AU prompt: "the one where your soulmate’s name is on one wrist and your enemy’s name is on the other and you have no clue which is which."

Sami has the same name written on both wrists.

This isn’t such a shock - there are some great classic movies and novels about star-crossed soulmates with the same name on both wrists - but it’s unusual enough to make his parents send him to a bond counselor when he’s sixteen. The guy was full of shit, asking him thinly-veiled questions about his feelings, trying to get him to admit he was confused or ashamed of being queer; Sami isn’t confused, and there’s no shame when he thinks about liking boys as well as girls. The BC tries to hedge with Sami, saying that ‘Kevin’ is a pretty common name, it could be two separate people.

Sami knows - he knows, and he doesn’t know why - that they’re not. He agrees only to get the counselor to leave him alone. Because having the same name on his wrists means he’s destined for an interesting, at the very least, love life. Whoever this “Kevin” person is, Sami is guaranteed not to be bored, never have to worry his soulmate is with him because fate said so.

(The Islam thing is trickier: the Qur'an says those born with _asma almarati_ , mirror names, are both blessed and cursed. It is clearly the will of Allah that this man or woman be subject to such a thing, so the person must have great strength in order to love and hate the same person, but it is also a curse to hate that which you are fated to love.)

He doesn’t really get it when he’s younger. He doesn’t want to be ordinary, and he thinks this is the proof - and he isn't wrong, but he isn't right, either.

***

Meeting Kevin - *his* Kevin, his soulmate - is like nothing he ever thought it would be.

He knows how others have described it, the feeling of warmth at meeting a soulmate, the lightning strike of an enemy. Books will tell you how you can feel your soulmate approaching, smell them on the air. Movies dramatize the meeting of enemies with a low ringing in the ears and a tightness around the heart. It’s nothing like that.

It’s a normal June morning, a few weeks before his eighteenth birthday. It’s an arrogant golden boy from Rougeau’s, slumming it in IWS, and Sami derisively tells him he’ll give him a pity match before he goes running back to Papa Jacques. It’s the old-sweat reek of the canvas and the tightness of the ropes when he runs them, waiting for the kid to finish warming up. It’s the kick to the gut of their first lockup - a fist around his heart and what he thinks is his entire soul bursting into flame - as they break apart, gasping.

Kevin’s storm-grey eyes are so, so wide, and he flips his left hand upright first. Left is traditionally the enemy-side, and Sami’s name is inscribed there in spiky letters, the “S” curling almost into cursive. Sami turns his own left hand over and shows Kevin his own name, the script more fluid, rounded from years of Arabic writing. Sami feels himself smile in challenge, and Kevin matches it, dropping down for a single-leg crab Sami immediately rolls through into a dropkick.

Move and counter, chaining and reversing. Perfect synchronization, and when they’re finished - the whole IWS crew making jokes about enemy-chemistry - Kevin follows him back to the locker room. Sami thinks Kevin’s going to try to punch him because isn’t that what enemies do? Like Shawn and Bret? 

Kevin just grabs at Sami’s right hand and holds it up in his own right hand.

Kevin’s got Sami’s name written twice, too.

***

Over the years, Kevin does prove to be that blessing and that curse, but more importantly, he proves to be himself. Singular and powerful and the perfect match to Sami. They are the proof for the wrestling business that enemies make the best opponents and soulmates make the best tag teams, the first mirror-bonded ever.

They build each other up.

They tear each other to pieces.

They fight and fuck and never, ever lie to each other.

For their entire indy run, Kevin has taped his wrists. It is the sole thing he refuses to reveal to the audience (who have seen Generico’s left wrist and surmise Kevin is his fated-enemy), and Sami does the same. Sami wrestles in Reseda and New York, then at Full Sail with both wrists taped, keeping his secrets. He and Kevin debate revealing the mirror-bond, but they both agree they can’t. Steen and Generico *must* be enemies, must fight forever, with nothing to taint their work.

And then comes R-evolution, and Sami kneels in the ring with gold in his hands, watching Kevin run down the ramp. His wrists are bare.

Sami is overwhelmed, because he knows what will happen next. He clings to his soulmate even as he knows his best enemy is planning his downfall. He sheds tears into Kevin’s shoulder and wipes the blood from his nose even as he waits for the turn. Kevin is careful never to allow both of his wrists to be seen by the camera, until he pulls Sami to the ramp and then powerbombs him into the ring apron.

The crowd howls, but Sami can’t hear anything. Can only watch as Kevin walks up to the hardcam, then holds up his wrists to let everyone read the mirrored writing.

“This is just the beginning,” he says, a threat and a promise.


End file.
